“What if I fall?” I hesitate.
“Oh but, what if you fly?” the scrappy Brazilian smiles back at me.
I am hanging off a cliff’s edge by a rope, and the Brazilian instructor is encouraging me to lean right back, into the salt spray. It goes against instinct to move in the opposite direction of safety, to lean away from the ancient limestone rock I am clinging onto for dear life. I am trying not to look down. Out of the corner of my eye I can see the Caribbean Sea crashing onto the jagged iron-shore and oversized rocks, perhaps fifty or sixty feet below. Not a tree in sight, no soft obstacles to break my fall if this manoeuvre goes wrong. Don’t look down, I repeat to myself firmly, silently.
“Just relax, and lean back. You are going to be fine.” the instructor coaxes. Yeah right, I think.
It takes a whole lot of trust to let go of something solid and lean back into nothingness. I am learning how to rappel down a cliff face for the first time. And it’s much more of a mental challenge than I thought it would be.
Earlier this month, our circle friends decided we would visit Cayman Brac, Grand Cayman’s smaller, rugged ‘sister’ island. ‘The Brac’ as she is affectionately known, has a charming population of around 2000 inhabitants (who call themselves ‘Brackers’), plenty of fertile inland vegetation for hikes, and a supremely dramatic 153 ft high ‘bluff’ (that’s a cliff face) that runs the length of the island’s 14 square miles. We had booked ourselves into the luxurious boutique hotel Le Soleil D’Or which has recently reopened under new ownership, and had immediately lost ourselves to total relaxation within the lush gardens. The hotel is more of a private house than a hotel, with a few satellite rooms situated around the central restaurant. The onsite farm supplies most of the delicious Caribbean ingredients for breakfast, lunch and dinner, which is entirely convenient when you fancy only taking a few steps from your bed, to your pool lounger, to your next meal. Upon arrival we were greeted with ice cold face towels and freshly squeezed juice from exotic homegrown fruits with names that we had never heard before. We were so well looked after by the staff, we may never have ventured outside of the property, but there’s a lot to do in Cayman Brac, if you’re game. Within the first 24 hours, we had already enjoyed a beach-side massage, a bike ride to the lighthouse point, and two long hikes through overgrown trails. We all agreed we needed this distraction from real life, which, let’s face it, effing sucks right now. And all this activity was very calming for the mind. So there I was, slowly unwinding, right up until the point where I find myself on a rock-climbing course, wondering why-oh-why am I so high up, when I know I have a fear of heights?
We are all born with the fear of falling, apparently. Yet it seems that my limber Bluff – climbing companions have overcome this at some point in their lives; when after their skilful rappel down the cliff face, one by one, they each gaze up, enquiringly, at my awkward situation. I am for some reason transported back to a memory from nursery school, at Caracas Elementary, when I peed my pants, and the teacher loaned me a pair of course forest-green knickers as a replacement garment. It felt like everyone knew I was scared and embarrassed, and were staring intently to see how well I would cope with my predicament.
As I am clinging onto the high rocks, it crosses my mind that I can simply quit, but I want to be a better person than that. Everyone feels fear. It’s how we handle it that matters. When I speak with friends on the subject of fear, it seems it’s everywhere. We fear beginnings, we fear endings. We fear change, we fear ‘staying stuck’. We fear success, we fear failure. We fear living, we fear dying. Some of us fear public speaking, making decisions, aging, intimacy, driving, being alone, ..the list goes on. It’s exhausting. And irrational. So how do we push through fear, to a position of lightness, power and excitement?
Just relax into the infinite nothingness, an inner voice urges me. My skilled friends send up calls of encouragement from the shore. I lean back, with my faith in the ropes, and the Brazilian’s instructions. I start to descend the near-vertical ancient limestone face, with a doubled rope coiled around my harness, fixed at the highest point, and I let go of any physical attachment I once had with the rocks.Wind-tears steaming across my cheeks, heart thumping painfully in my chest, but I am flying!
Did I survive the drop? Of course I did. Just like every person before me. Once I had let go I felt empowered and confident that I could do it. I simply needed the courage to let go in the first place. That simple experience taught me that I can handle whatever life brings. I’ll just have to remember this kick-ass moment, next I feel the fear, and start to freak out about falling, failing… or whatever.
Our group stayed at The Manor House in Le Soleil D’or, did the Rappel Tour with climb.ky in Cayman Brac.
